Cartographers take pride in their work, typically applying all the rules and principles of good cartographic design to their work, all in an effort to make people want to look at and appreciate their work (See Esri, Make Maps People Want to Look at). However, in this new era of social sharing it seems that the map has been replaced by the Infographic and the data visualization, a mashup of data, graphics, and maps presented in an effort to tell a story. Now us geographers are well aware of story telling via map, however, to this new breed of data visualists the focus has sadly been on quantity rather than quality. Bloggers, publishers, newspapers, etc… run to the web, download data and mashup the results in creative and not so creative ways, the end result is often a map but sadly, the product is also something your GEOG 101 Prof would likely slap you if you called it a map!

From Smart Growth America… In 2012, pedestrians accounted for nearly 15 percent of all traffic deaths, up 6 percent from 2011 and representing a five-year high. More than half of all pedestrian fatalities occur on arterials, and over 60 percent of these tragedies occur on roads with speed limits of 40 mph or higher. These roads were not planned or designed for more than speeding traffic – Dangerous by Design 2014spotlights the issue of pedestrian safety and the factors that make walking dangerous—and identifies the tools and practices available to put an end to the decades-long neglect of pedestrian safety.

LOL, I love this one… it seems NATO Canada via Twitter was trying to set Mr. Putin and all of Russia straight by giving them a bit of a geography lesson! Using Twitter as the platform of war (make Tweets not War right!) a map was shared that clearly revealed what was Russia and What was NOT Russia – take note Mr. Putin!

What do the USGS, Bloomberg, USA Today, the United Nations, the National Park Service, the FBI and others have in common? All of these well known orgs rely on MAPublisher software from Avenza systems to help them create and author awesome maps for their clients, customers, and the public. At R. 9.4 MAPublisher boasts loads of new functionality to support your cartographic and map publishing needs. In addition to supporting pretty much ALL of the most common GIS and mapping data formats, MAPublisher works seamlessly with all common GIS and mapping platforms.

MAPublisher 9.4 for illustrator

And so, the following are 10 New Features in MAPublisher 9.4 (for Illustrator):

How do you increase awareness about the important topic of Bullying… you create a heat map naturally! Indeed, that’s exactly what one savvy youngster from Virgina has been doing via a project know ass BullyVention.

Now here’s an interesting new effort, a project that maps Zombies! Yes indeed, this kickstarter project does just that and you can be the proud owner of the map if you elect to back the project! And those of you sitting back and making cool maps every day, take note that this project has already scored more than $11K in funding!

I’m not calling this a “best” list as that’s pretty tough to call, however, it is a fine list of sweet maps and data visualizations that we enjoyed and shared with the community during the first half of 2013 – enjoy these visualizations mapping music, sports, Cardinals, and even hate! Do you have a favorite Map or DataViz from 2013? Please ping me @gletham

Moore, Oklahoma, before and after the tornado, seen by Astrium Satellite
Satellites, operated and built by Astrium, number three company in the world for space technologies, have captured this image of Moore, Oklahoma, which clearly shows the devastation caused by the massive tornado that swept through the region on May 20, 2013.

TweetPing Maps The World’s Twitter Activity in Real Time
I simply had to share details of this awesome real-time map of the world’s Twitter activity so you could enjoy the awesomeness of it – Enter TweetPing.

Here’s details of a pretty sweet data access tool from the NOAA Coastal Service Center– the Data Access Viewer. In a recent update from NOAA we learn that Many new LiDAR data sets recently have been added to the resource. More details available in this announcement.